To appreciate this film, you have to also appreciate, or at least tolerate, quirky directorial decisions.
The story takes place over an adult's lifetime - from when young women were living 2-to-a-room in a company dormitory, to the "present day" (main story line) when the woman is only months from retirement. To linearize the story, she gets married, has a child, finds out that her husband is homosexual, but remains married. Divorce seems to have been occasionally mentioned, but the couple are never on the same wavelength at any time.
The pregnant daughter returns home from the U.S., white husband in tow, in order to give birth in China. The mother is a constant tale of woe, starting with her dog switching allegiances to her husband. Even though she is interested in going to the U.S. with her daughter, she refuses to divorce, but instead joins a Buddhist cult, trying to pray her husband into being cured of homosexuality. From flashbacks, confrontations, and silences, various pieces of family history and secrets are revealed.
A subplot involves the husband's lover marrying a lesbian, so that her IVF baby can have legitimacy. Together with the mother's caution against the gossips for anyone unmarried over the age of 30, this film suggests that, over the years, traditional respectability is still a major social force in China.
